blog - Amanda Falconerhttp://amandafalconer.com/blog/Tue, 16 Jul 2013 04:05:29 +0000en-USSite-Server v6.0.0-16499-16499 (http://www.squarespace.com)Seth Godin and me: on the same pageTrue Story Marketingcontent marketingAmanda FalconerMon, 08 Jul 2013 01:08:54 +0000http://amandafalconer.com/blog/2013/7/6/seth-godin-and-me-on-the-same-page518b7120e4b0826a8ac855d1:518b7121e4b0826a8ac855d5:51da101fe4b01ae13112f46eIt's clear that Seth Godin and me inhabit two different universes. Him:
best-selling author, major business builder and frequently original
marketing thinker. Me: moderately-selling author (and yes, actually we both
share Penguin I believe), growing business builder and sometimes original
marketing thinker.
So I was kind of chuffed this week to read this post from Seth about the
key elements of a marketing promise, uncannily similar to some of the
messages in my recently produced True Story Marketing Manifesto.It's clear that Seth Godin and me inhabit two different universes. Him: best-selling author, major business builder and frequently original marketing thinker. Me: moderately-selling author (and yes, actually we both share Penguin I believe), growing business builder and sometimes original marketing thinker.

Seth's talking about the story of Jack trading the family cow for some worthless beans that turned out to be magical and how the deal was done. His third step to a successful marketing promise is to tell a true story.

You must be able to keep the promise. If not, you're ripping people off and shortcircuiting any chance you have to build something of value. If the beans hadn't grown, end of story. Future sales will come when Jack tells his friends...

Seth goes on to say that marketing failure occurs because at least one of these three elements isn't present.

In the True Story Marketing Manifesto I talk about how I think marketing is both broken and misunderstood. I also talk about the fact that your brand is a real life story, told in three acts. Act 1 is the promise. Act 2 is the experience and Act 3 is the memory.

Your promise is what
attracts prospects to you, told through what you write and what you say.

The experience is how you deliver on the promise, what it’s like to do business with you; uour systems
and processes and how you behave.

Then, if
the unique promise is pitched at the right people AND backed up by an experience
that’s in perfect alignment, then you can’t fail but to create a powerful memory
– and loyal customers.

And loyal customers are the goal. They buy more, cost less to serve and spread the story of your brand.

]]>Seth Godin and me: on the same pagePro bono marketing: our love job of the weekAmanda FalconerFri, 05 Jul 2013 22:27:52 +0000http://amandafalconer.com/blog/2013/7/6/pro-bono-marketing-our-love-job-of-the-week518b7120e4b0826a8ac855d1:518b7121e4b0826a8ac855d5:51d7473ce4b001cbc64b023aDonations to worthy causes are fine - and at my company Talking Brand we
regularly donate to three charities - but this week marked the beginning of
a whole new approach to lending a helping hand.
You know how it feels when you get the idea of the perfect present for
someone you care about, find it, and then give it to them...and they just
love it too? When their face has that delighted, almost childish thrill -
and not that awkward 'oh, fuck, I hate this but I have to be polite now'
look?Donations to worthy causes are fine - and at my company Talking Brand we regularly donate to three charities - but this week marked the beginning of a whole new approach to lending a helping hand.

You know how it feels when you get the idea of the perfect present for someone you care about, find it, and then give it to them...and they just love it too? When their face has that delighted, almost childish thrill - and not that awkward 'oh, fuck, I hate this but I have to be polite now' look?

Well, this week I had one of those moments.

(Warning: apparent meandering in this post. Stay with me. Please.)

This year I started boxing at the Sydney Uni Boxing Club, conveniently just down the street in temporary digs while they wait for their new facility at the Uni to be built. I love it. It's old school, gritty, tough - everything you think boxing training should be. Which is why, when I was roped in to being the Publicity Officer a few weeks ago at the AGM and they told me they needed a new website, I had an immediate vision of what we needed to do.

Roll forward to this week, and we launched the new site complete with a series of videos cut from footage my team shot one night during training. They are exactly as I imagined. And what's more, the guys at boxing love them too. Here's what one of the other office bearers wrote in an email to me:

Superb work, very professional. Videos deserving of the palm d'or. Evocative story with music and intriguing characters. Michael looking every inch the Vinnie Jones tough hombre hero. Amanda looking the super cool athletic spy. Joel looks every inch the regimental sergeant major who stared down a civil uprising. Many thanks Amanda. Fantastic work the club members will be ecstatic.

Add that to the looks on people's faces (and the likes on Facebook - less thrilling) and you can't help but feel great about what you did. And on the subject of doing, a great big shout out to my team Pat - camera, editing, original music and ideas, Carlos - camera, editing review and ideas, and Vic - editing review and great feedback.

So here's my latest idea, which takes us back to where I began with this story. We're still going to continue donating to Medecins San Frontieres, buying Xmas gifts 'for' clients of chickens, goats and canoes for people in need around the world (Oxfam), and being a Monika's Doggie Rescue Lifesaver.

However now, I have decided, we're also going to choose 6 or so charities a year and go make something for them. It may be a video with a social media campaign, or a new website or whatever; the point is that we're in a position to make a contribution that has a potentially far bigger effect than our dollars can. And we can have a bit of fun doing it. I mean, we loved doing the boxing one. It's our craft, and it's nice to give something away that you made, too.

So, Monika's Doggie Rescue is going to be the next cab off the rank (they don't know that yet so sssh) and then after that,each member of the team gets to choose the charity or cause of their choice. The rough rule will be that we will need to do it only spending about a day each of our time on it per month, minimising direct external costs too.

As a way to make a social contribution, I feel good about it. What about you?

]]>Recruitment: is a good marketer really so hard to find?Amanda FalconerMon, 01 Jul 2013 05:19:56 +0000http://amandafalconer.com/blog/2013/7/1/recruitment-is-a-good-marketer-really-so-hard-to-find518b7120e4b0826a8ac855d1:518b7121e4b0826a8ac855d5:51d111a2e4b01d5d20f7c837Three simple things could get you to first base – if that’s really where
you want to be. Sometimes, I’m not so sure.
At my company Talking Brand, we’re recruiting for a Digital Marketing
Manager (so if you know of someone great, do let them know).
And, as anyone who’s done it can attest, recruiting can be a joyless, time
consuming task…andThree simple things could get you to first
base – if that’s really where you want to be. Sometimes, I’m not so sure.

At my company Talking Brand, we’re
recruiting for a Digital
Marketing Manager (so if you know of someone great, do let them know).

And, as anyone who’s done it can attest,
recruiting can be a joyless, time consuming task…and it can also have you
shaking your head in wonder. Before I comment on three things applicants
routinely overlook, let me just say this: we’re recruiting for a marketer for
goodness’ sake. A marketer involves a special set of skills.

Among other things, they need to know how
to find out about a target market (research, reasoning); about how to position
an offer to deliver what that target wants (deductive reasoning,
communication); and use the right channels to get the offer and product to the
market.

Given that it’s a digital marketing role,
they also need to know a whole lot of other things as well of course, but those
three marketing basics are, well, basic. Which is why I wonder of people are
really serious, when they do things like this:

1.
Send a resume without a cover
letter

What signals ‘I
don’t care’ faster than a resume without a cover letter? In my book, nothing.

Here’s the
thing: No cover letter, no reading of the resume. No cover letter, no
opportunity to set yourself apart in terms of why you want the job or why you
should be interviewed.

Not sending a
cover letter also suggests two other things, aside from indifference. (Or
stupidity.) That you think your experience is so shit-hot that it speaks
‘volumes’ and, that as a person, you’re only as much as what you’ve done. Neither
of those can ever be true.

That’s because
we don’t just employ people for their functional competencies; we also employ
them for their motivational fit – and that’s all about who they are as people.
In addition – and this is important – how can you actually even be a good
marketer for me, when in a situation where you have to market yourself, you
can’t even do something as basic as use the right channels to get your offer to
the market?

2. Address a cover letter with a generic name

Great. You
actually wrote a cover letter. You get 10 points. Oops, it says: To whom it may
concern, or something else equally generic. When there’s a name on the job ad,
use it. Nothing signals ‘generic’ and ‘I don’t read’ faster

than a cover letter
with a generic address.

Ok, so you
suckered me into reading it and giving you 10 points; but sorry, I now just
took them away again because you couldn’t be arsed writing to me. Personally.
No effort, no reward.

And in case you
think that I think a job is something bestowed on a grateful recipient; think
again. I know it’s a two-way exchange. But it must begin with some effort on
both sides. As an employer I go to the effort of crafting a job that I think
explains what it would be like and the kind of person we think would thrive.
Your job, is to respond in kind.

3. Fron up to an interview without having been on your website

You must have
done a couple of things well, because now you’re here at an interview. I did a
few this week and here’s what I noticed. There were two applicants who had
downloaded at least two reports each. One seemed like they’d read them. Another
had downloaded something else that didn’t need an email address and with all
three I could tell that they’d looked at other pages on the site.

But not for
long. (I can see from our dashboard exactly what pages each of those three
people went to and for how long. Not a helluva lot for people contemplating
moving to a new workplace.)

As for the
others interviewed – if they visited the site they certainly only did so anonymously
and given that we have at least three special reports on our site, I thought it
interesting that they didn’t look at one.

But here’s the
other reason I know that they didn’t do that much research. They had bugger-all
questions. Now I know that as a marketer, asking questions is one of the things
I need to do best in life. It goes hand in hand with the marketer’s
curious-gene.

In contrast, I wonder if they know how much
research I do on them? If they’ve got a decent cover letter and resume, they
may end up in my short pile. The recruiter will typically phone screen these
and while she does that, I google all of them to see what social media/web
profile they may have. I go to their LinkedIN page. I check if they’re on
Twitter and if so what kind of posts they’re doing. Later, if we’re getting
serious I may check up and see if I can find them on Facebook – purely to see
of they sound like the kind of person we want to have around 5 days a week.

Then, for the interview, I have a list of
generic questions, but I also have some that are related to their specific
experience. I have a couple of members of my team take them for coffee to get a
better sense of them and so the candidate can also get a feel for us. Finally,
if we’re happy with them and wish to proceed, I may set them an exam. When it
comes to referee checking, I make a series of other specific questions I want
drilled into by the recruiter.

That’s my research as an employer. How
good’s yours as a prospective employee?

By the way: this is NOT a blog post that
should encourage agencies to contact me.

]]>Customer experience insights: my open letter to the doctors, physios, X-Ray practices and other medical services businessesAmanda FalconerMon, 01 Jul 2013 05:19:37 +0000http://amandafalconer.com/blog/2013/6/24/customer-experience-insights-my-open-letter-to-the-doctors-physios-x-ray-practices-and-other-medical-services-businesses518b7120e4b0826a8ac855d1:518b7121e4b0826a8ac855d5:51c7ca17e4b0fb3400e77cb7Warning: possible rant factor. Sometimes I think that medical services
business have forgotten they’re actually businesses. While their patients
are patients, we’re also their customers – and we can walk away.
Look to the right and you’ll see my foot. In a retard boot. It’s fractured,
and it hurts, and it’s the subject of today’s whinge highly considered post
about
Warning: possible rant factor. Sometimes I think that medical services business have forgotten they’re actually businesses. While their patients are patients, we’re also their customers – and we can walk away.

Look to the right and you’ll see my foot. In a retard boot. It’s fractured, and it hurts, and it’s the subject of today’s whinge highly considered post about customer experience in medical services and how a few simple things would improve them.

First up, when I leapfrogged the lazy, six and a half foot tall guy who didn’t bend over very far at boxing on Wednesday night, I did NOT think that I’d end up on the other side with a fractured plantar calcaneal bone spur. In fact, I didn’t even know I had a bone spur.

After doing it a few more times before calling the girl-card and asking him to bend a little lower, my foot was really starting to hurt. But hey, you finish what you start, right, so I didn’t realise how sore it was until the whole class finished the leapfrog warm up.

By then I couldn’t walk. By then I was on ice, and the girl I was supposed to spar thought I’d done it on purpose. (Ok I was gutless, but I’m not that chickenshit.)

I shuffled the next day around and made it to the Drs, to the X-ray joint, back to the hospital to pick up the X-rays, and back to the Dr for the next steps. I did a bit of waiting around. And here are a few of the things that I noticed, because the marketer in you should never be asleep…

]]>LinkedIn challenge: taking issue with Liz Ryan’s Five Deadly Personal Branding IllusionsTrue Story MarketingAmanda FalconerSun, 23 Jun 2013 04:46:04 +0000http://amandafalconer.com/blog/2013/6/23/linkedin-challenge-taking-issue-with-liz-ryans-five-deadly-personal-branding-illusions518b7120e4b0826a8ac855d1:518b7121e4b0826a8ac855d5:51c67d9fe4b0998b1b55cb00Human Workplace CEO and founder Liz Ryan has lots of good advice in this
recent post on LinkedIn Today – but seriously, this personal branding
malarkey has gotta stop right now.
In case you didn’t know, Liz Ryan is the founder of a business called
Human Workplace, and much what they stand for is just great. In essence,
the business is a think tank, consulting firm, search firm and Human Workplace CEO and founder Liz Ryan
has lots of good advice in this recent post on LinkedIn Today – but seriously,
this personal branding malarkey has gotta stop right now.

In case you didn’t know, Liz Ryan is the
founder of a business called Human
Workplace, and much what they stand for is just great. In essence, the
business is a think tank, consulting firm, search firm and an online community.
The team works with employers to re-invent HR and leadership practices to
support people, not policies, and they do it all with a ‘human voice’.

Yes, it’s true. I AM just like the people
Liz was quoting in her opening par. “People protest,” she wrote: “‘Oh, I don't
have a personal brand, and I don't want one’ but that's like saying ‘I choose
not to cast a shadow when I walk in the sun.’"

A cute baby does not have a personal brand!

Actually Liz, I don’t think that’s right. When
you support your argument by saying that: “You've got a brand. Newborn babies
have their own brands ("Ooh, have you seen Amanda's little Dexter? He's so
strong, he can hold his head up already and he has the cutest mop of
curls!")!” I think you’re off your freakin’ rocker.

How does the fact that people ooh and ah
over a baby’s curls demonstrate he has a brand? He’s a cute baby for goodness
sake, nothing more.

Here’s the thing: A brand is a story and
it’s a real life story told in three
acts. Act 1 is the promise, act two is the experience and act three is the
memory. I believe it should also be an honest
story – which is what I lay out in the True Story Marketing Manifesto – but it’s a carefully crafted story nonetheless.

Now let’s think about a human being. As Carrie Fisher said so well and so long ago in her book Postcards from the Edge, “I’m not a box; I don’t have sides”. What
did she mean? I think she’s saying: We’re flesh and blood. We’re history. We’re
desires. We’re at times conflicting interests; passions for everything from
felting to fast cars; from business to boxing.

Of course, as you say, people form opinions
about us, but that’s nothing to do with branding. And while you may sympathise
with people like me for whom the term ‘personal branding’ is a term that makes
them want to ‘hurl’, I also don’t believe it’s a surrogate for what you
describe as “just a newish term for self-description and reputation, two
phenomena that have existed for millennia”.

All that said, there are some people who do
have personal brands like say Tiger Woods, or Serena Williams, but in their
cases, the brand – around which an industry is built - is merely eponymous.

The same cannot be said for most people –
and nor do they have the potential to create one.

Don’t get me wrong; people DO need to
market themselves – especially in the job market and as business owners and
entrepreneurs. To do that they do, as you quite rightly suggest, need to “simply
tell your story. Use the first person, and write a paragraph or two that lays
out where you came from and what you care about. Skip the corporate-speak
jargon and sound like a human being.”

With those sentiments I couldn’t agree
more. But that’s not developing a ‘personal brand’. That’s sharing yourself.
And ultimately, the people who will probably be the most desirable and
influential in both job markets and other spheres, will be the tribe leaders
and the lynchpins (hat off to Seth Godin here) – not the people in pursuit of
some spurious notion of a personal brand.

]]>LinkedIn challenge: taking issue with Liz Ryan’s Five Deadly Personal Branding IllusionsFood is king: get that right, and you'll bring in the crowdsgreat placesAmanda FalconerSat, 01 Jun 2013 01:30:11 +0000http://amandafalconer.com/blog/2013/6/1/food-is-king-get-that-right-and-youll-bring-in-the-crowds518b7120e4b0826a8ac855d1:518b7121e4b0826a8ac855d5:51a94df3e4b0687273e36342 "What are we doing to drive people to our places?" asks Rob Spanier, from
the Canadian firm LiveWorkLearnPlay. He goes on to present the power of
markets to generate local business: their data shows that typically 60-80%
of neighbouring businesses report higher sales with the presence of a
farmers market, and that while 800 people are generally needed to support
one it can also drive several thousand visitors in a season."What are we doing to drive people to our places?" asks Rob Spanier, from the Canadian firm LiveWorkLearnPlay. He goes on to present the power of markets to generate local business: their data shows that typically 60-80% of neighbouring businesses report higher sales with the presence of a farmers market, and that while 800 people are generally needed to support one it can also drive several thousand visitors in a season.

In the town of Rockford, which 6 or 7 years ago tied for the worst place in America, its farmers market was the catalyst for 57,000 visitors last year - 92% of whom came from outside the downtown area and 29% from outside Rockford. 67% visited other downtown retailers, generating another $1.1m in spending.

In Saxony, its farmers market - with 16 vendors - had 1,700 visitors a week visitors over 17 weeks in year 1. In year 3, it had 30 vendors and 11,000 visitors per week over 20 weeks.

Spanier goes on to challenge the planners and urban designers in the room to understand that community outreach and collaboration goes well beyond a town hall session or a 5-day charrette and that planning and implementing a farmers' market is an opportunity to bring people together. But, he warns, it's just like your garden; you need to nurture it. Or like a commercial property that you own: you need to maintain it. Start with a detailed business plan, and a clear idea of what you're wanting to achieve.

Enter showman place maker Gilbert Rouchecouste

We switch pace dramatically - and accent I'm happy to say; as this is my last session before I head home to Australia I thought it was a nice touch that virtual-Australian (OK he was born in Mauritius but that's no Mauritian accent you're hearing), Gilbert Rochecouste takes the podium.

A flamboyant showman who used to be the GM of the southern hemisphere's biggest shopping centre, he realised his heart was really in the village. Now, he explores "how we go deep and not wide in place making" and his passion is markets and food and the theatre of both.

He talks passionately and lovingly about the 50 lane ways that have put Melbourne on the world map. "They're the living system of cities; the DNA," he says. "They give you that sense of deep intimacy, of place; they're eclectic and gritty."

He talks about markets as economic, cultural and social generators: they attract crowds, they create confidence around the precinct, they're catalysts; they're marketable and a great testing ground. But markets need to be authentic to work. "We're good at doing beige but we need to bring in the grit," he says.

He claims that cultural diversity is one of the keys to a great market, and that characters and traders are the best place makers. "Get the collection of the right traders," he advises, "because bad coffee can kill a place, have you noticed?"

And look for opportunities for theatre - what we crave in an increasingly bland retail world. Help your market tell stories, because "each great city has five to ten great rituals that are embedded in the psyche, and these create a sense of place."

For instance, if you want to find the soul of Darwin, go to the night market and observe the ritual that 10,000 other people observe, as they go onto the beach and watch the sunset. (And get pissed, I would have thought, knowing tropical and slightly mad Darwin, city of the Beer Can Regatta.)

Or in Melbourne go to Queen Vic market - with the biggest organic section in the southern hemisphere, and 25 delis; it has critical mass and it's a destination.

Rouchcouste also talks up the power of the night markets to activate your night time economy. The key is to have a compelling story and concept, get the retail mix right - and curate that into a new narrative of place.

Above all, remember that food is king - get that right, and you'll bring in the crowds.

]]>The sharing economysharing economyAmanda FalconerSat, 01 Jun 2013 00:53:44 +0000http://amandafalconer.com/blog/2013/6/1/the-sharing-economy518b7120e4b0826a8ac855d1:518b7121e4b0826a8ac855d5:51a9450de4b0e3038176beddThe sharing economy - or as some people describe it, the collaborative
consumption economy - is big business. And as the ins and outs of AirBnB
and CouchSurfing and Kickstarter are best left to those who have a need to
use them, I'll content myself here with a few stats that give you an idea
of just how big that business is - or is going to be.
First, a definition: The sharing economy is about monetising the surplus
value of the things you own by giving others access. (Or put another way,
collaboratively recirculating the dormant use of assets, facilities or
skills, for money.) It's a highly disruptive economic proposition that'sThe sharing economy - or as some people describe it, the collaborative consumption economy - is big business. And as the ins and outs of AirBnB and CouchSurfing and Kickstarter are best left to those who have a need to use them, I'll content myself here with a few stats that give you an idea of just how big that business is - or is going to be.

First, a definition: The sharing economy is about monetising the surplus value of the things you own by giving others access. (Or put another way, collaboratively recirculating the dormant use of assets, facilities or skills, for money.) It's a highly disruptive economic proposition that's also (mostly) dependent on the social web and trust.

It's also moved from the online platform to the offline. Here are some of the stats:

AirBnB, has 800,000 city listings globally and in 2012 generated $180m in revenue. Couchsurfing has had 3 million people users. ZipCar recently sold to Avis for $500m.Car sharing now is predicted to generate revenues of $3.6billion in North America by 2016..Crowd funding - built around the online model - is forecast to exceed $5billion in contributions by the end of 2015. In 2012, Kickstarter hosted 73,620 projects, generating $381m in funding (44% were successfully funded). One interactive comic book - where you get to pick the end that you want - raised $10m itself. The originator now gives it away.

And globally, 2 million trips taken via bike share per month.

Bike share: the revolution

A quiet revolution that began with free (too much damage and theft) and is now, in its fourth generation, IT-based, bike shares are popping up all over the place. Real Estate Development and Finance Anlyst Lee Sobel lays out the facts on bike share (and points us to this cool bike trip animation here.)

The bike share of today is usually a membership model that's joined with a credit card, unless you're low income, in which case special arrangements apply, like joining via phone or library, often at reduced rates. This allows the bike you're using to be monitored on where it's taken from, where it is now and where it's put back. Members usually get the first 30 minutes free (is it because he's a financial analyst that he knows to adjust the seat before logging on, so as not to waste those precious 10 seconds taken with adjustment from seat position 10 to 6?) and then they're charged a fee per 30mins thereafter.

Data shows that most trips are 22 minutes on average and therefore most revenue comes from tourists and - wait for it - gay members. (I'm disappointed that he didn't explain more about the latter.) If a station is filled, you can get 15 mins extra and go to another station.

The San Fransisco pilot project has apparently also established the base operational model, looking at job, residential, and retail density, as well as topography and other factors to drive the location of the stations. Each network typically has 20 - 30 stations, costing about $43,000-$50,000 per bike station with 20 bikes in each, with about $25,000 in maintenance each year.

It's an upfront and ongoing cost that can be met from a variety of sources, with a series of benefits that span both the health and social arenas.

New Orleans food start ups

Perhaps it's the fact that after Katrina, New Orleans lost a third of its restaurants. Or perhaps, they just love to eat. But I am astounded at the number of food incubation examples that are going on in New Orleans.

For instance, Edible Enterprises is home to 29 start ups. With a recommended $2,000 before you begin, both young [people but more commonly older people, can simply swipe their membership card and access the shared commercial kitchen, logistics and marketing facilities.

Another venture, Cafe Reconcile, teaches disadvantaged kids the whole food industry. Each chooses an element of the industry to learn about, but they also get other teaching too: vocabulary, work and life skills, with the prospect of work with chefs around town at the end of it.

There's also a strong agricultural industry in the city. With a Community Support Agriculture initiative that sells produce not from regional farmers, but from the city's experimental farm and a host of backyard growers, urban micro-farms, and community gardens.

Finally, the Tulane Teaching Kitchen, an initiative of the Goldring Center for Culinary Medicine at Tulane University, and the first dedicated teaching kitchen to be implemented at a medical school, is moving into a big box space, where it will give hands-on training for medical students through culinary medicine classes as well as continuing education for the healthcare and foodservice industries.

]]>Tactical urbanism - building a constituency for your plangreat placesAmanda FalconerSat, 01 Jun 2013 00:52:16 +0000http://amandafalconer.com/blog/2013/6/1/tactical-ubanism-building-a-constituency-for-your-plan518b7120e4b0826a8ac855d1:518b7121e4b0826a8ac855d5:51a939bfe4b02f35a70dea92I've been listening to Columbia Department of Planning's Kimberley Driggens
give example after example of art and culture 'temporiums'. The point, is
that they have all helped, as she describes it, "build a constituency for
your plan".
Example 1
With a department of planning grant, 34 crafters and artists came together
to serve 800 people in the first hour, and generate $31,000 in sales in 24
consecutive days.
Example 2
As one of four art and culture temporiums launched last summer, focused on
four different communities, Lumen8 Anacostia used a
I've been listening to Columbia Department of Planning's Kimberley Driggens give example after example of art and culture 'temporiums'. The point, is that they have all helped, as she describes it, "build a constituency for your plan".

Example 1

With a department of planning grant, 34 crafters and artists came together to serve 800 people in the first hour, and generate $31,000 in sales in 24 consecutive days.

Example 2

As one of four art and culture temporiums launched last summer, focused on four different communities, Lumen8 Anacostia used a grant from Artplace America, properties owned by private owners (these temporiums are a great marketing tool for developers, she notes) to deliver a three month-long arts festival that transformed the historic area of Anacostia through temporary illumination of shops and buildings coupled with exhibitions and events.

Loosely based on white nights arts festivals held around the world, Lumen8 was "catalytic", bringing 3,500 to 5,000 people to the opening night, improving the area's reputation over the longer term and even triggering H Street Playhouse to permanently moved to their temporary home during the festival - the previously unused police evidence warehouse.

Example 3

The area plan called for enlivening retail, creating active, walkable streets and more. Using temporary street furniture and a plaza mock up, intervention recreated one of the plan's renderings to show what it would look like. They also created multi-functional furniture, and had a design-build workshop where people from the community could come in and make and paint the furniture.

What underpins all of these interventions is the idea of building capacity within the neighbourhoods and a constituency for their plan. To make that work, developing neighbourhood partnerships is key.

What's next for Driggens and her team, is a new thing: the idea of creative play - enabled through a series of adult and youth play spaces. They're launching a national design competition soon to seek innovative and creative art, to be located where "there's a dearth of play spaces".

]]>A not so big house in the fleshAmanda FalconerFri, 31 May 2013 21:42:53 +0000http://amandafalconer.com/blog/2013/6/1/a-not-so-big-house-in-the-flesh518b7120e4b0826a8ac855d1:518b7121e4b0826a8ac855d5:51a918dae4b02f35a70dbbd9I wrote earlier about Sarah Susanka's presentation to the CNU this morning
- and also mentioned author Jeff Speck's marvelous 'triangle' house in
Washington, DC.
In a failure of technology - as I blog my way around the traps with urban
design and town planning client RobertsDay, I elected to go ultralight in
my technology kit, leaving behind laptop and big cameras and bringing
instead my iPhone and ipad - I can't get back into a published post on my
SquareSpace iPad app to add pics of Speck's house to the post... I wrote earlier about Sarah Susanka's presentation to the CNU this morning - and also mentioned author Jeff Speck's marvelous 'triangle' house in Washington, DC.

In a failure of technology - as I blog my way around the traps with urban design and town planning client RobertsDay, I elected to go ultralight in my technology kit, leaving behind laptop and big cameras and bringing instead my iPhone and ipad - I can't get back into a published post on my SquareSpace iPad app to add pics of Speck's house to the post...

So, here, on its own, is the house I so admired earlier in the week....video with Speck coming soon at www.robertsday.com.au.

]]>The not so big life: Sarah Susanka at CNUgreat placeswalkable citiesAmanda FalconerFri, 31 May 2013 20:50:00 +0000http://amandafalconer.com/blog/2013/6/1/the-not-so-big-life-sarah-susanka-at-cnu518b7120e4b0826a8ac855d1:518b7121e4b0826a8ac855d5:51a8f717e4b02f202603c02bSarah Susanka, architect and author of the Not So Big series of books that
began with The Not So Big House, had two key messages for this audience of
planners, urbanists, architects - and me (as none of the above) - at the
CNU 21 this morning:
1. How do we make these ideas simple enough for people who aren't trained
in this - that is architecture, planning or urban design - to understand
and recognise that this is what they want; that this is the way to connect
to their values.
2. What do I know (as a practitioner) and how do I bring that out into the
mainstream?
Susanka, argues that everyone is searching for a sense of home. Emerging
from architecture school, she tapped into that need - andSarah Susanka, architect and author of the Not So Big series of books that began with The Not So Big House, had two key messages for this audience of planners, urbanists, architects - and me (as none of the above) - at the CNU 21 this morning:

1. How do we make these ideas simple enough for people who aren't trained in this - that is architecture, planning or urban design - to understand and recognise that this is what they want; that this is the way to connect to their values.

2. What do I know (as a practitioner) and how do I bring that out into the mainstream?

Susanka, argues that everyone is searching for a sense of home. Emerging from architecture school, she tapped into that need - and a middle class America desperate for design help and built a thriving practice of 45 architects. For a time, that work was fulfilling; working with people who didn't realise that architects could help them and educating clients that 'more' can't fill that void inside.

"People are looking for home," she saw, "but they're looking with the wrong tool; it's quality not quantity...You don't need all this square footage; you just need a place that feels like home."

At some point, though, this work wasn't enough, and Susanka went on to give expression to another great love; this time, writing. She began to write a series of books for people who are almost universally looking for a different experience in their homes and places; people who see their home as a sanctuary, not the place to knock the socks off their neighbours.

"It's a sensibility," she says. "It's not about size - which is probably about a third smaller than you thought you needed. We have this notion of how we live but we don't really live that way; your home needs to be an expression of who you are."

She's talking to me here, I know it. And I'm reminded of our visit to the home of Walkable City author Jeff Speck earlier in the week, as part of the 2013 Great Places Tour with client RobertsDay and their clients.

Speck treated us not only to lunch, but also a wonderful tour of his unusual home - and the story of its birth and design, and the way they live in it today. It's a home about the same size as mine, filled with compact, well-used spaces - there didn't appear to be one that wouldn't be used every day; as well as some lovely features that were a kind of architectural art, like the three-level steel staircase and triangular windows cantilevered out over the base of the lower storey.

I chatted to some of my fellow tourers afterwards, and what was common among some (is it telling that they were largely from the institutional investors? Or is that unfair, and is it more that they have children and I just have to accommodate Michael, me and the dogs?) is that while they admired it, they couldn't live in it, in a fit. Whereas I would be right at home...

But back to Susanka.

She points out that we all long for both shelter and vista; she describes the fact that just as we all have a 'musical ear' (some more developed than others), so too do we have a sense of space. The difference is that we have no language to describe it - which sounds somewhat similar to my visits to the art gallery; I am, I fear, among those heathens who can really only say 'I liked it' or 'I didn't'.

Our job, she says - meaning the practitioners in the audience - is to try and connect people to their spatial sense. When we show people a floorplan, it's just like looking at the map of a city; neither give you a sense of what the place will be like, and that's because the information you need to understand is in the 3rd dimension. There's some little idea that makes the difference and it's in the 3rd dimension, like in some of the pictures below: the light to walk toward and the arch; both change the entire experience.

For a long time. Susanka had been trying to get a major builder interested in building a show home that could display - for 6 months at a stretch - some of the things she's been talking about in her books. She finally got her chance with a smaller production builder, in the new town of Libertyville Illinois.

There, they created a show home just off the Main Street; while it's 2450 square feet which is apparently average size, it displays "everything I know" built in, she says.

Recognising that in Libertyville the developer was trying to create a 'porch community', she also recognised that the typical design of a home wasn't conducive to those porches being used. The question is, how do we distribute rooms if we're going to have a front porch community? To get people there, it must be a natural flow in the house, she says.

As a result, in this show home, the kitchen and dining area bleed out to the front porch and the stairway has been moved to the back of the a house so it doesn't interrupt the living area. Here it not only serves as a thermal chimney but in its screening, as a piece of art too. (Susanka says that sustainability is "woven right into the fabric of the design and the home.")

The garden space has been put on the roof of the garage and there are also other typical Susanka details, much discussed in her books: variety in ceiling heights, spaces that do 'double duty', like dining rooms that are both formal and informal - and can accommodate Thanksgiving lunch with a simple switch of furniture, for that important one day of the year.

Not so big living

Finally, Susanka gets around to the idea of 'not so big living' which she acknowledges sounds touchy feely and in some ways is. "It's a different type of moreness," she says. And in advice to the planners and the urbanists in the room, she suggests that language is something to consider when tapping into people's desire for what we're building; describe things in language they can connect with. It could mean that mixed use becomes an activity pocket and live-work units might become house above.

She picks up on the trend towards sharing - amplified as never before but not new, really. (Which is all the more interesting as I've just stepped out of the Sharing Economy session; post on that to come.)

Once again demographics are important: boomers are fearful of being isolated and want great places to age in place. Pocket neighbourhoods teach important lessons: built around a green area not the street with a community gathering spot and for example, maybe one lawnmower for eight houses, sharing is built right into the infrastructure of the community.

Susanka makes a link though to the series of crises that have swamped - in some cases literally - America, and says that "in crisis, people forget their worries about their own turf, and become more connected."

And here, now, she exhorts us (and others as I assume, judging from the copy of the Not So Big Life book that I have just bought) to make room for what really matters; to take back the part of our lives that nurtures us.

"Find what inspires you, and place your focus there," she says. "As you focus on it, you'll find more of it, because our thoughts are the architecture of our world."

]]>Designing the land that you and I ownwalkable citiesgreat placesAmanda FalconerThu, 30 May 2013 21:55:56 +0000http://amandafalconer.com/blog/2013/5/31/designing-the-land-that-you-and-i-own518b7120e4b0826a8ac855d1:518b7121e4b0826a8ac855d5:51a8d1a6e4b08c2bc46d3cdeI've never really thought about who owns the streets before, I have to
admit. Have you? But when you do think about it, we do. In fact, our
streets aren't only owned by us, in many places they're also the bulk of
our public space. (Chicago's streets represent 23% of land area and 70% of
public space.) And, in places that are becoming more and more dense -
something I love - that public space is key; after all, we've traded off
the private space to get it.
So this is the context in which I'm listening to Victor Dover and John
Massengale present at CNU 21, who are about to launch a book later in the
year, called STREET DESIGN - the secret of great cities and towns. In the
book - and here - they're challenging the notion of the complete street,
arguing that complete doesn't mean it'sI've never really thought about who owns the streets before, I have to admit. Have you? But when you do think about it, we do. In fact, our streets aren't only owned by us, in many places they're also the bulk of our public space. (Chicago's streets represent 23% of land area and 70% of public space.) And, in places that are becoming more and more dense - something I love - that public space is key; after all, we've traded off the private space to get it.

So this is the context in which I'm listening to Victor Dover and John Massengale present at CNU 21, who are about to launch a book later in the year, called STREET DESIGN - the secret of great cities and towns. In the book - and here - they're challenging the notion of the complete street, arguing that complete doesn't mean it's a great place.

They're preceded in that with a short talk by Urbsworks' Marcy McInelly, who makes the point that streets are public space with a civic role to fufill, that we need a more democratic allocation of the street space, that streets and buildings work together to define the public realm; they contribute equally. Form based codes, she argues, are helping create a more cohesive way of achieving this when for so long they have been separated to the detriment of place. After all, public rooms that are formed by buildings.

In addition, walking is the fundamental unit of street and network design. As a result, human scale - and beauty - is important as we reclaim the most important function of our streets which is walking. You thought streets were about cars, right? Think again.

When John Massengale takes the podium he opens with the statement that three pictures really are worth a thousand words. We see Broadway back in the day - with no striping, no signals, no signs, streetcars and lots of people, We see New York today. We see Main Street Nantucket as it used to be too.

Looking at Main Street he points out that at 85 feet across it's big enough to be a place but narrow enough to see across. He notes that engineers don't like "fixed vegetative containment zones" - trees in other words - but that here, they contain the street. He follows its curves and says that one way to address topography is to lay a blanket on top of it; another is to pretend you have no earth moving equipment, and let the road vary with the topography.

Going back to New York, Massengale points out that it was the first 'complete street' in New York; a place where 80%of New Yorkers don't own a car.Here though, we have a suburban arterial through the middle of New York, designed for the 20% at the expense of New Yorkers. "It's a one way road designed for throughput," he says. "It's signed at 35mph but to beat the light cycles, people regularly go at 40 or 45 mph."

While the space here is designed around throughput - there's nothing here about the public realm for people who don't have cars - Massengale acknowledges that there's much that the Department of Transport has got right, when you consider Madison Square, the city's bike lanes, and the bike share which just started this week.

Massengale points to other examples that demonstrate the fact that a complete street is not necessarily being a great place: 9th Street, NY and a street in Long Beach California: "When you see these arrows you know you're not in a people space, you're in an auto space," he says.

He goes on. "We're not talking but about going back to the Broadway of the past, but let's not forget it. It's a place where cars go slowly; it's not dominated by the detritus of traffic engineers."

If people drive more slowly, they're not likely to kill you. "Go slower, see more," he says.

Victor Dover: 4 remarks on street design

Bringing up the rear of this trio, Dover really just made me want to read the book. I'll content myself here, with the highlights of Dover's four remarks on street design. But first, an assertion: Even the best cities are overrun by traffic. Something to remember, as we think about great streets and places.

Revisiting and seeing anew places and streets all around the world, Massengale and Dover asked themselves, among other questions, what has happened in the best street retrofits? We see Kensington High St which had been transformed from an auto sewer into a vibrant, much visited place. But the thing to notice is the mInimal colour, the minimal stripes, the minimal signals. Bear this idea of 'less' in mind as we go forward.

1. On networks: "When there are a lot of streets and intersections the game changes fundamentally." Suddenly you have lots of alternative routes, and lots of opportunities for different types of streets - and as a result, different experiences. (See RobertsDay on Vine for the video about this.)

2. On one-way streets: "We fight against this...BUT. You can do it, IF you have a large network of streets. Skinny is sexy and property values go up when streets are skinny."

3. On pedestrian streets: There's been an over-implementation of the ped. mall. But it can work like it does in Charleston, to deal with large blocks, and to deal with topography." (And even Melbourne got a mention! "Melbourne's beauty is it's small streets," Dpver says.) His message is also to 'pedestrianise' creatively - do it at different parts of the day for instance.

4. On street space: "We still think of the street as a tube of space; extruded like a dimensionally accurate piece of steel." And while regularity gives order to a city we also need to look at where the vista goes. "If it's a room, it doesn't just have two walls." Dover shows us Galena and how the slightest curve helps the street conclude; becomes a series of spatial experiences that are linked.

Looking at the great streets and laces around the world, there's a regular rhythm to the events; something happens to end one segment and start another. "Even in places where repetition is used to signal order, or the dominance of the state, or the rational workings of the nation, even those places have that; a series of experiences," he says.

Remember that when you're arguing with the traffic engineer, he advise. "This segment doesn't have to be treated as you treat the rest."

]]>Lean. The new urbanism.new townswalkable citiesgreat placesAmanda FalconerThu, 30 May 2013 17:05:16 +0000http://amandafalconer.com/blog/2013/5/31/lean-the-new-urbanism518b7120e4b0826a8ac855d1:518b7121e4b0826a8ac855d5:51a78ec3e4b0fd1b0016795cFor many people in Australia, the term 'the new urbanism' is something of a
dirty phrase. I'm not sure if it's because it conjures images of
traditional architecture or something far deeper. However, perhaps the term
proposed by keynote speaker Andres Duany, himself one of the founders of
the new urbanism, may appeal more.
I'm sitting at the Congress of New Urbanism at the end of the 2013 Great
Places tour with client RobertsDay. In a long presentation containing
several complex arguments that I'll make no attempt to summarise, Duany
pitched the ingredients ofFor many people in Australia, the term 'the new urbanism' is something of a dirty phrase. I'm not sure if it's because it conjures images of traditional architecture or something far deeper. However, perhaps the term proposed by keynote speaker Andres Duany, himself one of the founders of the new urbanism, may appeal more.

I'm sitting at the Congress of New Urbanism at the end of the 2013 Great Places tour with client RobertsDay. In a long presentation containing several complex arguments that I'll make no attempt to summarise, Duany pitched the ingredients of lean urbanism.

He also suggested that we learn a lesson about lean urbanism from Salt Lake City - even though "we all came here knowing Salt Lake City is the worst city we know". While the present Salt Lake City isn't what the founders had in mind because it's been affected by sprawl, the planned Salt Lake City was really intended as the 'gentlest grid'. It was also built with very little money but a lot of smarts. After all, the Mormons built something close to 736 cities in 100 years, and that's an American success story.

However, Duany also described Salt Lake City as a study in successional urbanism - a series of buildings built 'on the same chassis'. It was also an approach used at Seaside - and in fact the first decade of the new urbanism, when everything was incubated.

Instead of pitching the 'climactic condition' on day one, Duany says it's "all about being lean again". And, while there's a terrific bias everywhere for hi tech green, that approach is, he believes, destined to fail. In fact, Duany contends that Seaside really had modern green solutions long before hi tech came along - sustainable urban drainage, reflective roofs, walkability, native plants - but they were there because it was cheaper. "It was the recession and Davis was saying we had to be smart," he says. "Debt drove us to environmental solutions."

He mounts the argument that in 2008, the century began. At the time there was the real estate bubble which revealed that the US is broke; that while we might have reached peak oil, energy will never run out and the permanent condition is that it's just never going to be cheap; that climate change is real and is also the long emergency; it's a slow motion crash that casts a pall.

Our challenge is that we need to work with the demoralisation of hitting one tipping point after another. However, citing Kunstler, we can turn all these problems into a virtues and pleasures and joys, if we too don't get infected with the pall, he says. In the face of people giving up: re-embracing big houses (when did they not?) and big cars (not in Australia) we can have urban agriculture, and walking, and ceiling fans, and porches and more.

Duany says that LEAN is the now urbanism and that for the new century; about the protean organism that is CNU, the idea of viruses and membranes, the vernacular mind, a subsidiarity process and successional growth; interim buildings, light green tech, pink codes, flexbuildings and pod practices.

Let the other groups be the heavy artillery. The right place for the now urbanists is as the light cavalry: organised but nimble.

]]>The children are the canary in the coalmineAmanda FalconerWed, 29 May 2013 23:32:34 +0000http://amandafalconer.com/blog/2013/5/30/the-children-are-the-canary-in-the-coalmine518b7120e4b0826a8ac855d1:518b7121e4b0826a8ac855d5:51a7c94ce4b040eeeb863897I'm listening to journalist and author Richard Louv open the Congress for
New Urbanism conference in Salt Lake City, and I've had a mini-aha moment.
To understand this, you need to know that I'm in the communications
business: a marketer, working with the owners and general managers of
medium sized businesses to tell their true brand stories. (Yes, we practice
true story marketing because marketing that's bullshit is broken.)I'm listening to journalist and author Richard Louv open the Congress for New Urbanism conference in Salt Lake City, and I've had a mini-aha moment. To understand this, you need to know that I'm in the communications business: a marketer, working with the owners and general managers of medium sized businesses to tell their true brand stories. (Yes, we practice true story marketing because marketing that's bullshit is broken.)

The other piece of context is that I am happily and determinedly childless; except for our two dogs Alfy and Mondoe, seen on the front of this very site. (And the ones that follow in the pawsteps of Flick and Finkel; but that's another story.)

And that's key, because what I've just seen in Richard Louv's presentation is a way to garner a larger slice of mindshare about what it takes to create great places. Call me superficial (and slow) but because of my distaste-for-children-lens on the world, it's taken me a while to see that kids are the key - for others. And in the work we do for pioneering urban design and town planning firm RobertsDay, creating and presenting their thought leadership pieces not only to their industry but also the community at large, focusing on the kids as well as the need for a great Australian housing diet, could mean the difference between a narrow audience and a wide one; a force for change and a ripple.

But back to Louv.

Our divorce from nature

Louv talks passionately about our divorce from nature - and the problem with that. (Having just picked up a copy of his book The Nature Principle, I'm sure I will find out just how bad that divorce is, and what it's costing us.)

For children, the stats are clear. Within three decades we've seen the virtual disappearance of children's play in the natural world, he says. And why? Fear of strangers is one thing and it permeates everything. However the fact is that the number of children being abducted has been going down for thirty years as has violence towards children. You wouldn't think so though, if you're watching the news. And Louv cites the 24 hour news cycle as a key factor in our being conditioned to be afraid.

The cost to all of us of our divorce from nature is staggering. But for children in particular, there's been a rise in ADD, depression, inability to experience pleasure in play, and inability to visualise. Preschoolers are apparently the fastest growing market for anti depressants, and in a recent study (details of which haven't noted down) 7 year old children demonstrated an executive function (the ability to be your own boss and do the right thing) of a 5 year old of the 50s.

Louv also bemoans the fact that our work in the office staring at a computer screen blocking off senses is the very definition of less alive. You think we have only five sense? Today scientists conservatively say we have ten; some others claim we have 30. That's a lot of life we're blocking out.

Urban nature

With this in mind, Louv asserts that everything in the next 40 years will change - and that the inclusion of nature in our urban environment will accelerate and in fact, is already happening. For instance, workplaces are designed with nature embedded in them; we have urban agriculture popping up all over the place. People are recognising that it's not only wilderness that's important but also urban nature.

Add to this the rise of the family nature club - multiple families going on a hike together - and the fact that some pediatricians are now prescribing "green exercise" and you have the beginnings of a whole new constituency for new urban developments.

And here we come to Louv's message (or one of them), and my a-ah moment. "Build a constituency out there that cares about something even bigger," he says. "Use what's happening to our children as a doorway."

Antidote to depression

This morning Andres Duany talked about the negative pall cast by reaching successive envronmental tipping points; the feeling of 'it's too late', so it was interesting to hear Louv pick up on the same theme. He told a story of listening to a 20 year old who said: "If you're young, all my life I've been told its too late." That is the dominant message. And where is the hope in that?.

Louv notes that as of 2008, more people around the world live in the cities than the country. (Just another aspect of Duany's contention that the new century began in 2008 by the way - read more in my lean urbanism post here.) He argues that one of two things will happen: that the fragile connection people have with nature will sever forever OR we will see the beginning of a new kind of city; cities that are engines of biodiversity.

He calls for a 'home grown national park' created by planting indigenous plants in our own backyards ad attracting the insects and birds and animals back to our cities; bringing nature home. He cites the example of cradle-to-cradle exponent William McDonagh and the Spanish hospital that not only has a green wall, solar panels and a vertical food wall, but also incubates and regularly releases an endangered butterfly.

"One building can't save the world," he says, "but here's one that's not only saving energy but also producing human energy and also giving birth."

"We must create nature in our cities," he exhorts.

]]>Streets of gold: there's a revolution going ongreat placesAmanda FalconerWed, 29 May 2013 20:01:10 +0000http://amandafalconer.com/blog/2013/5/30/streets-of-gold-theres-a-revolution-going-on518b7120e4b0826a8ac855d1:518b7121e4b0826a8ac855d5:51a92d6fe4b0144f85a23451Yesterday, I was listening to Victor Dover and John Massengale explain why
a complete street doesn't necessarily mean a great place. So as I come back
to write up my post from the "Streets of gold: High value via walkable
urban thoroughfare design" session, I can't help but see it in a different
light.Yesterday, I was listening to Victor Dover and John Massengale explain why a complete street doesn't necessarily mean a great place. So as I come back to write up my post from the "Streets of gold: High value via walkable urban thoroughfare design" session, I can't help but see it in a different light.

That said, the first amazing fact is that in Chicago, streets represent 23% of its land area and 70% of city's public open space. Wow. Obesity costs Chicagoans $1429 individually (42% more than the average) and the state $700million pa. They have a lot of crashes and pedestrian fatalities and know that there's a high correlation between crime and crash data.

This then is the context for the Complete Streets Chicago Guide, the default modal hierarchy of which is pedestrian, transit, bike, and then car. (Janet Attarian went through a number of examples too, but I've decided to skip right to the thing I found fascinating: about bikes, who rides them and quite possibly why Sydney Mayor Clover Moore copped such a hard time with her implementation of city-wide bike lanes. More in a minute..)

The second amazing 'fact' (I use that word loosely), is that there's a revolution going on and it's to do with bikes. For instance, Illinois has included peds and bikes in the agenda for the first time, creating the Illinois Bike Transportation plan, and becoming the 9th most Bicycle Friendly State in the US.

But third, and finally, it's Rock Miller who turns on the light as far as the psychographics of bike riders are concerned. Read carefully: understanding these profiles could be the key to a successful bike revolution in your city, and a failure. According to Miller, the vocal minority of the bike riding world are the strong and fearless. Representing just 1% of the bike population, they're typically John Forrester disciples, want maximum visibility when riding; and in fact they actually ride like their a car. They take the lane - and the podium; they're the ones who fear loss of rights, who run lots of advocacy groups and who'll oppose much of what you, the planner, may want to achieve, with your bike lanes and other 'special facilities'. That said, if you're in a place without bike facilities, they're way of riding is the safest.

Next up are the enthused and confident at 7% of the population. A growing segment, that often includes weekend club and race riders, they prefer properly designed facilities and debate with the 1%.

They're followed by the interested but concerned - 60% of the total; a group that own but seldom use their bikes; that have bike racks and drive to natural trails but rarely ride on the city street. They'll listen to ideas and options and their greatest resistance is fear...

And then, finally, we have the no way, no how at 30% of the total. They'll never be your friends and they oppose any loss of space for the vehicle, and may use the data from the 1% to oppose you.

So, with those psychographics in mind, have fun with the revolution...!

.

]]>Walkability: the new way to tell our story #CNU21great placeswalkable citiesAmanda FalconerWed, 29 May 2013 16:56:13 +0000http://amandafalconer.com/blog/2013/5/30/walkability-the-new-way-to-tell-our-story-cnu21518b7120e4b0826a8ac855d1:518b7121e4b0826a8ac855d5:51a760d6e4b05eecc44246ccI'm listening to Jeff Speck (@jeffspeckAICP) at the Congress for New
Urbanism today, which is a lot of Jeff really, having just had lunch at his
house earlier in the week with the 2103 Great Places Tour hosted by client
RobertsDay, and having just read - and blogged about - his book.I'm listening to Jeff Speck (@jeffspeckAICP) at the Congress for New Urbanism today, which is a lot of Jeff really, having just had lunch at his house earlier in the week with the 2103 Great Places Tour hosted by client RobertsDay, and having just read - and blogged about - his book.

But it's OK, actually, because he speaks well, and of course this isn't territory I know so well that I don't need to hear it again. While I've written earlier on his argument about walkable cities and parking economics, and his argument about induced demand (more interesting than you think), and the 10 steps to walkability, (but have never gotten around to writing about how our built environment is killing us, or the economic value of walkability - read the book for those) I thought it was worth giving a quick recap of the highlights from yesterday. (And writing the world's longest paragraph in the process.)

Firstly, think demographics. (And notwithstanding that Speck's chapter on this, which condenses part of Chris Leinberger's message in the book The Option of Urbanism is good, I also happened to hear this from the source himself earlier in the week; video and presentation coming soon. However if you want to hear a similar presentation given in Kansas check this video out here.)

Leinberger's point - or one of them, as I am drastically oversimplifying - is that we've simply got less children. These are the demographics. And with that comes a change - the baby boomers and the millenials want to live where the action is - and that should be downtown..

Then think economics and in particular the economic impact of driving less. For example Portlanders now drive 4miles less each day and 11minutes less per day. The money they're not spending on driving goes somewhere and it's not out of the community. It's no accident that young people moving are moving to Portland in droves.

Then recognise the epidemiological argument: which is quite simply that sprawl is killing us. Speck contends that research shows that you can talk all you want about diet, and yes, it's important, but inactivity is the killer and it's because we have engineered the useful walk out of our lives. He cites the gluttony vs sloth study in the UK, where two groups of people had sensors in their knickers as far as i can recall, and ate the same food. One group also exercised; no prizes for which ones lost weight.

Then understand the crash data, and in the US, they apparently lose 14 people per hundred thousand each year to car crashes. (And I think, but cannot verify from my notes, that this is pedestrian fatalities caused by car crashes, as this is after all, the point.)

Of course, there are many other factors that make the argument for why walkability is key, but for that, honestly, read the book. Let me now look at a few snippets of how you actually make a city walkable.

First, where is walkability possible, because the fact is that it's not possible everywhere? Speck says that what's missing in most down towns is housing but he also goes on to say that there are about 100 moving parts that add up to a city feeling walkable.

Some of these are block size - and when you double the size of the blocks, you also triple the number of lanes. However, when you widen the street (more lanes) in anticipation of forecast demand you then cause that forecast to occur. (This is back to induced demand - read the post: Build it and they will come: remove it and they will go.)

The fact is that congestion is the one true pain - the more there is, the less we want to drive. (Although we bitch about it.) And, in economic jargon the car is a 'free good' because it's not costed properly (or fully), so the smart choice for many people IS to use the car. "Take away the highways," Speck says "and there's no carmageddon."

Something else to note - which frankly as a non-planner, architect or anything to do with the profession I find a fascinating lens on human behaviour - are that one way streets cause jockeying - because of course, the grass IS always greener and the next lane IS faster. Always. And that people drive faster in a wider lane - which there are more of due to changes in codes and standards; the suburban road width has been brought downtown. They also drive faster depending on the kerb radius too.

Speck also cites biking as the biggest revolution, that's underway in some American cities. For example Portland invested $60m over 20 years, apparently half the price of a cloverleaf road thingummy, and as a result, 37% of kids now walk and bike to walk when 10 years ago their stats reflected the national average. (About 10% from memory but I could be wrong.)

Studies show that even just putting brightly marked lanes on the road can triple the amount of cycles on the road (and watch out for a fascinating taxonomy of the cyclist from another CNU speaker 0- post coming soon). Speck also mounts the case that doing so is like having a "horizontal billboard" for the city: it says we're a healthy city, a young city, and we look to the future.

Another important thing to consider when creating walkable streets is the role of parallel parking: it's the essential barrier of steel that helps make pedestrians feel safe. (Safe is one of the four ingredients of walkablity which you can find in the post 10 steps to walkability.) Street trees are another important safety measure - a row of regularly spaced mature trees forms a wall. And, while some engineers believe it makes it less safe for drivers data shows that the number of accidents are fewer.

And this idea of a wall is interesting. I hadn't realised before about our desire to feel 'enclosed', but it makes perfect sense now. And, apparently, once you get beyond a 1:6 ratio of height to width you cease to feel enclosed.

Which leads me, none too seamlessly I admit, to these interesting facts: it only take 3 stories of building to hide 5 stories of parking garage and it only takes 25 feet of building to hide 100 feet of parking garage. And, if the economics don't support structured parking then wrap the donut.

"You have to do all if it you want to get people to walk", Speck says. But do it in places where it matters. For instance, Speck advises (and carries out) a 'frontage quality analysis' - work out your primary network of walkability then phase the revamping. Figure out anchors and paths. Fix the most important streets first then fix the street walls (where are the missing teeth) - build these places first he advises.

]]>The architecture of affordabilitywalkable citiesgreat placesAmanda FalconerWed, 29 May 2013 15:05:48 +0000http://amandafalconer.com/blog/2013/5/30/the-architecture-of-affordability518b7120e4b0826a8ac855d1:518b7121e4b0826a8ac855d5:51a9162ce4b070cc6c924894Firstly, if you come to a session called "The architecture of
affordability", you might be forgiven for thinking that it will be about
that: the architecture. But what I walked away with - reaffirmed from a
previous tour of affordable housing projects here in the US in 2006 - is
that the architecture they're really referring to is a financial one. It's
about the maths.Firstly, if you come to a session called "The architecture of affordability", you might be forgiven for thinking that it will be about that: the architecture. But what I walked away with - reaffirmed from a previous tour of affordable housing projects here in the US in 2006 - is that the architecture they're really referring to is a financial one. It's about the maths.

And although the US has a very different framework for encouraging and subsidising affordable housing, there are some transferable ideas to take away. But no silver bullet. Just in case you were hoping. (In Australia, where the land is say 60% of the cost of the ultimate house and land combination versus here where it may be as little as 30%, there are very different economic fndamentals at play - and that's before youi consider tax, and housing authorities and the like.)

Hana Eskra of Gorman USA, a 28 year old company working with civic leaders to solve community problems and primarily using the lever of tax credits to fund them, spoke a lot about the maths.

First, she wanted us to be clear just what affordable housing is, and I was surprised to find that this definition was actually established as far back as 1937, in the Housing Act of that year. It said that affordable housing is that which costs not more than 30% of your income. In that context, low income is 80% of median family income (median is about $51k pa) and this leads us to the "maths problem", Eskra says: they can't pay enough for a building we'd build. What they could pay is $520 a month - and that "barely allows us to keep the lights on".

"There's no money left to build that building and that's the maths problem," she says. "On one hand it costs about $200-$250k to build a unit. On the other, even if they earn $20/hr they can still only afford an $85k mortgage."

Dealing with that maths problem takes a sophisticated layering of financial instruments (which, ironically, means that accountants and lawyers get rich while others get affordable housing) and also the Choice Neighbourhoods Program which took over from a prior program (HUD 6). It's designed to not only have people develop a building but also the neighbourhood. With a possible planning grant of $300k and an implementation grant of $20-30million, the program wants to make sure that "instead of just focusing on public housing, you need to have a plan for transforming neighbourhoods.

Example: Nehemiah Spring Creek

Across the country at Nehemiah Spring Creek, in Brooklyn, New York, Alexander Gorlin Architects and others are dealing with the maths problem too. On a 50 acre site at the edge of the Jamaica Bay, which was landfill for 50 years with pockets of methane gas (which meant that when developed the whole site needed to be capped with four metres of sand) a group of people inspired by Johnny Ray Youngblood are creating something quite different to the identical, defensive, front loaded homes with big fences - "the suburban transferred to the urban" - that are nearby.

"At first I thought we should have ten different architects involved," says Gorlin, "but we couldn't afford it." Instead they created a series of three-bedroom units, 20x40 feet, sold as individual homes, and inspired by Bruno Taut's housing in Berlin, which used different colours chosen to reflect the direction facing the sun, to add variety. (Here, 12 colours somehow related religiously in some arcane way that I missed were used to achieve a similar effect.)

To achieve construction efficiency, the homes were brought forward to the street, incorporated rear parking, and were built using pre-fab modules built in a Brooklyn navy yard, with facades installed on site. They're 20 feet wide, because that's the maximum that can be transported through the streets of New York. (NY codes limit modules to 18 feet on bridges which is why the developers had to tender out to prefab firms in the city and not beyond.) Selling for $100/sq foot, there are now 568 townhouses, 700 units. a school on the site, and a large shopping mall nearby.

Example: Newburgh and Habitat for Humanity

Newburgh, NY, is one one hand an historic centre of American architecture. On the other, it includes a low income population that needs affordable housing. In a joint Leyland Alliance and Habitat for Humanity project, aimed at the existing population and designed for 25% to 60% of area median income (median income is $36000 here) some of the areas 'missing teeth' have been rebuilt and restored.

Habitat for Humanity operates on a model that requires a $1500 downpayment, a commitment (and proof of ability) to pay the mortgage, 400 hours of community service (building the homes), and participation in financial classes for 6 months.

The project had to overturn 86 planning variations just to put back what they'd just demolished but then went on to deliver affordable and contextually sympathetic architecture for $79 a square foot - versus the typical Habitat for Humanity building costs (for far less attractive homes) of $119 sq/ft. Part of this was achieved through good design and a production friendly approach: precast foundation systems were put in in a day, truss framing was done in three days, facades used pre-painted Hardie product.

Energy operating costs now average $80/mth, and, if educational achievements are any indication, the result is not just about money : grade point averages went from Ds to Bs and As.

The key, Leyland's Giovanni Palladino says, is to develop trust in the community, and Habitat was key in achieving that. "It's essential to find the leaders in the existing community to help you."

But, he acknowledge, in a place where 45% of the population is African-American it's disappointing that none of those people have applied.

]]>Profile of a developer: How a Yankee carpetbagger came to Alabama and grew a townAmanda FalconerSat, 25 May 2013 22:01:15 +0000http://amandafalconer.com/blog/2013/5/26/profile-of-a-developer-how-a-yankee-carpetbagger-came-to-alabama-and-grew-a-town518b7120e4b0826a8ac855d1:518b7121e4b0826a8ac855d5:51a28b8de4b0e2549bbef3a5The growing village of Providence, just west of Alabama, was almost just a
collection of apartment blocks. Half a million dollars had been spent on
planning and design, contracts with the master builders were ready to be
signed, and the dirt was ready to be turned. And then, on the eve of kick
off, developer David Slyman woke in the middle of the night and decided to
do an about-face.Observations about places, planning and architecture as I accompany client RobertsDay on the 2013 Great Places Tour. More detailed posts with video will appear soon at www.robertsday.com.au.

The growing village of Providence, just west of Alabama, was almost just a collection of apartment blocks. Half a million dollars had been spent on planning and design, contracts with the master builders were ready to be signed, and the dirt was ready to be turned. And then, on the eve of kick off, developer David Slyman woke in the middle of the night and decided to do an about-face.

His time in the small boroughs of San Fransisco and New York was the catalyst to create something far different. Spending half the night researching urban design firms who could bring his nascent vision to life, he told his wife when she got up the next morning that he was going to build a town, where you had all that you needed to live and you felt comfortable.

This is a story of having a vision, and building relationships, and understanding the market. It's also the story of a hard-working guy with a finance brain who listens. (And when the video of his hour-long talk is finally loaded you'll see what I mean.)

1. VisionSlyman's story of the pink brick house probably best sums up the idea of having a vision - and staying true to it. The scenario is this: The development - Providence - has been in development for some time. The GFC has hit. Everyone's doing it tough. (Even Slyman, who's selling more at Providence than anyone else around, is being squeezed; he's just lost $4million on a commercial building contract that went bad.) A woman and her husband come along and they want to build an $800,000 house in Providence. She wants to use a pink brick. David tells her 'no'.

Her: 'Whatddaya mean, y'all gonna run me offa here over a pink brick? I'm gonna build an 800 thousand dollar house!' Him: 'You could build a two million dollar house and you still couldn't do it in the pink brick.' Her: 'Why not?' Him: 'That pink brick doesn't fit with what we're trying to build here. So I'm protecting the value of what your neighbour's already got. If you built a two million dollar house in the pink brick it wouldn't be worth two million dollars when you've finished.' The husband: 'I told you honey.'

2. Building relationshipsIt's clear Slyman is a networker - a serial networker is how he describes himself. From the moment he blew in from Ohio 11 years before - a damned Yankee carpetbagger - he'd probably been charming the pants off all and sundry. Long before he began developing the 300 acres that is now Providence, he'd been doing small developments around the Huntsville area so he'd worked hard to create relationships with city staff in planning and engineering for instance, and it's a good thing he did.

After he'd researched 31 urban design firms and finally settled on DPZ, he decided to ring the Mayor. They didn't talk for long; he told her he had 300 acres west of Huntsville, she asked him which urban designers he was using, and then she told him to be in her office at 11 am the next morning.

When he arrived he had no idea that he'd be walking into a meeting with every department head in the city office. Nor that the Mayor would say this:

'Y'all know David. He's developing this land west of Hunstville. So here's the thing. Number one: He's using DPZ, the firm we couldn't afford to hire. Number two: We need development west of Huntsville. Number three: If I find any part of this project sitting on anyone's desk, then they're fired.' End of meeting.

Slyman says that he was horrified and had to ring up all the people he'd been creating relationships with to assure them that he'd known nothing about what the Mayor had been planning to do; after all, administrations come and go but the staff don't change quite so often.

3. Understanding the marketThis last, understanding the market, is very closely related to the second, building relationships, and while there are many examples of how well Slyman understands the market he's serving there are two anecdotes that seem to be illustrate the point. First, is that when he went to present the urban plan to the city officials, he knew that there was no way that he could foresee more than the zones of uses that would be needed over the next 20 years. "If you think I'm going to look into my crystal ball and try and slice up my lots for what I'll need over the next 20 years, then you're crazy."

Over the time of the development, he's read the market and responded; developing product that suited the time. For instance, Providence sits nearby to the Arsenal - and seat of 60,000 jobs; but also to Research Park - home to many of the US' top biotech and hi tech firms as well as growing start ups. And here, again, Slyman's networking comes into play. Chatting to two banking friends, he fond that they wanted to leave their firm and start up a new bank. He leased them one of the flex offices he'd created - groups of 12 or 13 small offices with a phone, internet, a desk and a shared reception area. They're now a $3billion bank - and the source of many referrals of other start up businesses.

I said earlier that Slyman was a guy who listened well and in this advice that he gives his staff in dealing with all people but particularly city officials, you can see one of the key reasons for what he calls his 'executional success'.

"Let them talk enough and they'll give you the recipe of what will work. And in some recipes, you'll find that sugar and salt do mix."

]]>Hampstead: chickens and children may be the key to successgreat placesnew townsAmanda FalconerFri, 24 May 2013 19:20:30 +0000http://amandafalconer.com/blog/2013/5/25/hampstead-chickens-and-children-may-be-the-key-to-success518b7120e4b0826a8ac855d1:518b7121e4b0826a8ac855d5:51a00685e4b0c8a2f31eef66Hampstead, a small new community in Montgomery, was planned - and
presumably financed - at a time when sales of 150 homes a year could be
expected. It began however during the GFC and since then they've sold 70
lots - plus a few commercial properties, but more on that later.Observations about places, planning and architecture, as I accompany client RobertsDay on the 2013 Great Places Tour. More detailed posts, with video, will appear at www.robertsday.com.au.

Hampstead, a small new community in Montgomery, was planned - and presumably financed - at a time when sales of 150 homes a year could be expected. It began however during the GFC and since then they've sold 70 lots - plus a few commercial properties, but more on that later. The point is that today's reality is selling 20 homes a year and that's not a lot - not when your holding costs might be as much as $250k a month. (Some of the plans had to be changed to fit the infrastructure already in to make sure the product they developed really met the market - the needs of which have changed over time.)

That said, one initiative and one serendipitous tenant may prove to be the catalyst for increasing growth. The initiative is the farm, based on the property and designed to provide both community plots and production farming land from which the produce is sold via a Community Sustained Agriculture program. With a take up much stronger than they expected - they have a waiting list of 50 - the developers have now taken on a second CSA farm. While it's a not-for-profit, it's turning into one of at least two key ingredients that are appealing to a particular group of people - senior military based nearby that are well travelled and educated as well as other families that are perhaps a little quirkier than much of their middle American counterparts (although not green particularly, as we'll soon see).

The other ingredient that's drawing in these people is the Montessori school, now about to open a high school to complement the pre- and junior school years already there. The Montessori school was brand new at Hampstead; it didn't relocate from elsewhere. Its presence has proved to a major drawcard for new families considering buying into Hampstead but it's now also beginning to be a 'lead generation' tool as parents of children coming to the school from outside the suburb are now thinking of moving to Hampstead.

While it would be nice to think that targeting the tribe of people who might find the Montessori school appealing was a deliberate marketing tactic, the reality is that it was purely accidental. Some teachers of another Montessori school in the region had split from that school and decided to go it alone. They chose Hampstead and they're now going from strength to strength.

That they were able to begin in the village so early on in the peace was due though to something that was deliberate: and that was the decision to build out the town centre way before there were the 'rooftops' sold to really support it. While it involves cost to do that, the developers really believed that it was important to show people just how this place would be different to what was around it; ultimately it would be easier to sell the reality vs the promise, they reasoned.

But, in another nice unplanned synergy, the school has now built the farm into their curriculum. Children walk across to or three times a week to tend to the veges and the chickens; they sells the eggs and make the money themselves.

So while sales rates are slow, they don't appear to be slow relative to what else is selling in the broader Montgomery area. And, they seem to achieve a price premium - up to 30%. Perhaps part of that is also due to the diversity of product and price point: below is a row of courtyard homes on the market for around $280k while 130m away is a large home that sold for $1.2m. The developers also say that's because they also sell on lifestyle not price per square foot. And when it comes to lifestyle, there's a lot to like they say.

If Montessori's not your thing then there are two other schools just two minutes away. There's a supermarket two minutes down the main road. On site, there's a coffee shop and library and pool, and service-based businesses located in the offices along the main street.

Finally, surprisingly to the developers, their buyers aren't that green. In one telling example, after building the state's first (and currently only) Green 3.0 home (a home built under a form of sustainability certification), the eventual buyer said, 'well, the only reason I'm happy to pay that $10k extra is because the house is on the end row and gets more light'. All the 'green' attributes weren't really valued. Despite this, the developers - through their own building arm - continue to do the most they can from a sustainability perspective (without being commercially stupid) because they believe it's right.

And maybe that heartfelt intention is part of what will sustain them over what will undoubtedly be a longer town development cycle than they'd planned.

]]>Rosemary Beach: best of the bunch?great placescoastal villagesAmanda FalconerFri, 24 May 2013 16:28:46 +0000http://amandafalconer.com/blog/2013/5/25/rosemary-beach-best-of-the-bunch518b7120e4b0826a8ac855d1:518b7121e4b0826a8ac855d5:51a00675e4b00ebfe3c6768dA lot of us seem to like Rosemary Beach and I'm no exception. I'm not sure
how much of this might be to do with the fact that we were hosted by town
architects Ron Domin and Doug Bock on our first night there, and toured
around by Doug (video coming soon) on our second visit because there's
unquestionably something that's added to the experience of a place by the
people you meet.Observations about places, planning and architecture, as I accompany client RobertsDay on the 2013 Great Places Tour. More detailed posts, with video, will appear at www.robertsday.com.au.

The place: Rosemary BeachWalk score: 51

A lot of us seem to like Rosemary Beach and I'm no exception. I'm not sure how much of this might be to do with the fact that we were hosted by town architects Ron Domin and Doug Bock on our first night there, and toured around by Doug (video coming soon) on our second visit because there's unquestionably something that's added to the experience of a place by the people you meet. At Rosemary we ate, mixed and even saw inside real people's homes - although that was real people with a helluva lot of money. (Like the guy who spent about $6million on the house to knock it to the ground to 'start fresh', rebuilding it for several million. Oh, and use it a couple of times a year. Profligate, is all I will say.)

So it's with an affectionate lens perhaps that we view the main street that leads down to the beach at one end and the square at the other, as working particularly well. Architecturally, it's diverse, but also consistent, including a number of mixed uses - live-works (like the one that belongs to Domin Bock) although not holding enough small courtyard spaces within it, according to Doug.

And, while we only saw about a fifth of the place - far from enough to judge it really - it definitely felt more homely and lived in and less resorty than either Alys or Seaside. The fact that about 30-40% of owners live there may have a lot to do with this as well as supporting what appears to be a wider economic base; as a town centre it's more urban and diverse than it's early coastal counterpart further east down the 30A. .

Interestingly, this town centre works well with what appear to be far fewer civic buildings but far more businesses - and a beautiful post office. Doug points out Rosemary's grassy square is far smaller and somehow less inviting than its equivalent at Seaside, but the effect overall is far more real life than movie set.

It too, has its version of Seaside's paths and streets but laid out far less regularly it seems. Here wide boardwalks about 8 feet across, bisected by narrower paths covered in shell grit form a pedestrian grid that's intimate and interesting. The effect is more discovery than pre-determined route; at Seaside you always know where the Gulf is while at Rosemary, you could almost get lost.

Architecturally the built form features a number of versions of the Charleston side home - a typology developed to cope with the hot and humid climate of Charleston and reinterpreted here; designed in a way that puts Rosemary in the middle of the privacy progression, allowing some semi private space at the fronts of the homes with more private space at the side. (In their original form, the Charleston side home was one room wide to maximise cross-flow ventilation, with a two storey veranda stretching down the long side.)

The carriage houses, built at the rear, also provide secondary rentals and help enclose the rear lanes, making them appear narrower than they are but also inhabited as well. With the homes designed by multiple architects (although Domin Bock have designed abput 40) but approved by the town architects, the result is less regular; interesting but not chaotic. This is probably increased by what seems like much higher density here than at Seaside, again partly due to the fact that there's far more land here on the beach side of the highway making a larger valuable piece of real estate. The solution? Get more homes into the area.

Wrapping up, it was clear that while not all of us may be as wealthy as some of Rosemary's 8 digit buyers, most of us could relate to it; we felt comfortable.

]]>Alys Beach - one step too far?great placescoastal villagesAmanda FalconerFri, 24 May 2013 15:27:02 +0000http://amandafalconer.com/blog/2013/5/25/alys-beach-one-step-too-far518b7120e4b0826a8ac855d1:518b7121e4b0826a8ac855d5:51a00668e4b0a2a2d2ef6686After the lead up on Alys, that it was the culmination of a twenty year
journey towards personal privacy along this beachside strip that runs from
Seaside to Rosemary Beach, I was prepared to be wowed. However, the reality
was more exclusive magazine than a place I'd be comfortable to call home.Observations about places, planning and architecture, as I accompany client RobertsDay on the 2013 Great Places Tour. More detailed posts, with video, will appear at www.robertsday.com.au.

Place: Alys BeachWalk Score: 26 (Low because it has only one corner shop and two places to eat.)

After the lead up on Alys, that it was the culmination of a twenty year journey towards personal privacy along this beachside strip that runs from Seaside to Rosemary Beach, I was prepared to be wowed. However, the reality was more exclusive magazine than a place I'd be comfortable to call home. (The fact that I'm also unlikely to have $7million to splash out might be a barrier too.)

While town architect Marianne Khoy-Vogt's explanation of the Alys vision was eloquent (the video of her presentation will be available soon), on the ground, today, the place left me cold. Or actually hot and cold: emotionally I didn't respond at all; physically, I was boiling, a fact not helped by the highly reflective white masonry walls and sparse shade.

Don't get me wrong: the houses themselves look beautiful, and seem very climate-appropriate with their internal courtyards cooled by water (which also acts as sound barrier to the neighbours). And the white isn't just there for glamour: apparently both a white and a green shade of paint were heat tested and the white walls meant it was 30% cooler inside.

Mike says that the central spine, with the pedestrian passages and the communal fire pit, "oozes character" and that in the future he can see that acting as a hub for social activity - as someone else says when the days are warm and the nights are cold. The car courts are works of art: they're detailed beautifully and they're inviting to walk in. And in 10 or so years the trees will have grown - and they'll be just like the leafy car courts that now work so well at Seaside.

Others noticed that the entry to every house is subtly different; the edible landscaping adds not only herbs but also colour to soften the white. Colour has been used in other ways too: some buildings use the aqua of the water and others a strong desert red. Hard landscaping elements have also been taken from outside to inside like the stones used to make the rug in the Moroccan styled pavilion at the pool and steel ball-bearing curtains in another.

Finally, you feel very safe - something that's the case at all of three of the towns. The fundamentals are there: you can walk and ride and don't feel you'll be run over by a truck. And, as people are basically tribal, and like to be like with like (something I might argue with but later), Alys Beach adds choice to the mix. With Seaside, Alys and Rosemary on offer, there's something for everyone (as long as you're white and wealthy).

Everyone's getting passionate now - Mike believes that this is getting close to the immersive urban environment, the ultimate he says, the urban corollorary of an immersive natural environment. Most European cities are an immersive urban environment; and the result is that you want to walk every street.

But back to real life in Alys today: in the absence of people today - 15% of the development has been built and a low proportion of those who've built actually live there - Alys is more like a glamorous photo shoot than a vibrant place. Given the clientele they're targeting - you can't even look at the homes without providing proof of ability to buy we heard - perhaps this air of insularity, and exclusivity and unnatural quiet and hotel-like facilities is just what they want. It's also a slow build; even with a sales rate of 27 this financial year so far (7 above target), it will be many years before Alys is alive.

But here's where Mike Day is adamant that I need to be patient.

"

You can't judge it overnight; in fact you can't judge a great urban place in under 10 years and Alys, isn't that old and has faced a GFC to boot. Corporate players aren't permitted to be patient. And that's why they can't create great urbanism. Them's fighting words: I must investigate that one over dinner later...